Hi Paul, Mike, I am currently evaluating how to approach fix for following problem you reported and commented on:
7058014 if svc-system-config creates rpool/export, it should mount it at /export As it's been a while since that discussion happened, let me try to start with summarizing the problem, then later take a look at possible solutions. Overview ======== System configuration (config-user smf service in particular) provides for possibility to create initial user account. As part of that, config-user service creates separate ZFS dataset for user's home directory. In default case, ZFS dataset '<root_pool>/export/home/<login>' is created with mountpoint inherited from '<root_pool>/export/home' parent ZFS dataset. Since all installers create<root_pool>/export and<root_pool>/export/home ZFS datasets during installation process (utilizing Target Instantiation module) with mountpoints set to /export and /export/home respectively, we end up with desired '/export/home/<login>' mountpoint for home ZFS dataset. Problem statement ================= That said, Automated Installer (used for installation of non-global zones) is a little bit special in a sense it provides for complete control over hierarchy of ZFS datasets created. That means it's possible to end up with a system without '<root_pool>/export' and '<root_pool>/export/home' datasets created during installation. Such configuration is accomplished via omitting appropriate entries in target section of customized AI manifest. In such case, '<root_pool>/export' and '<root_pool>/export/home' datasets are later created by config-user service along with home ZFS dataset as a side effect of calling 'zfs create' with '-p' option which forces creating all non-existent parent ZFS datasets. The problem is that those datasets are mounted on mountpoints inherited from parent dataset (<root_pool> ZFS dataset in this case), so we end up with following structure: dataset:mountpoint ------------------ <root_pool>/export:/<root_pool>/export <root_pool>/export/home:/<root_pool>/export/home <root_pool>/export/home/<login>:/<root_pool>/export/home/<login> Which is what user currently neither expects nor desires. Solution A ========== If my understanding is correct you propose to address that in config-user smf service by explicit setting desired mountpoints for all parents created. To be honest I am not quite convinced that's solution which fits the existing model, as sysconfig should not explicitly manipulate datasets which are out its scope (parent datasets). It's goal of Target Instantiation module to handle that task and spreading that logic across several places would be confusing as well as it does not sound as a good principle in general. Another issue I can see with this is that those datasets are explicitly configured in default AI manifests. If user intentionally omits those entries in customized AI manifest, I believe we should honor that and not implicitly create those datasets despite user's intent. Based on that, I propose following alternative. Solution B ========== If config-user is asked to create ZFS home dataset and its parents are missing, treat that as a fatal error. In such case, let config-user smf service inform user on console about that and let the service enter maintenance mode. The reasoning behind this is that such situation would be result of a misconfiguration on user's side, in particular that there seems to be a requirement to create ZFS dataset in ZFS hierarchy not compliant with the one explicitly expressed via AI manifest. I believe we shouldn't try to remedy such state, as we can't assure the result would be compliant with user's intent. Instead, we should let user know that invalid configuration was supplied. Please let me know if that may be a reasonable alternative or if I am missing other aspects of this problem which should be taken into account when looking for a solution of this problem. Thank you very much, Jan _______________________________________________ caiman-discuss mailing list [email protected] http://mail.opensolaris.org/mailman/listinfo/caiman-discuss
